Google launches appeal against EU's $2.9 billion antitrust fine

Internet giant Google on Monday appealed against the record 2.4-billion euro fine imposed by European anti-trust authorities for favouring its own shopping service, lodging an appeal at the EU court in Luxembourg.

Google last week notified the European Union it would attempt to meet the demands of the European Union decision.

At the time of the ruling, Europe's antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said Google's strategy for attracting customers to its online shopping service was not just about being better than rivals.

Google is required to stop the offending practices by September 28th or face additional fines that could amount to five percent of Alphabet's daily average worldwide revenue.

The consideration of this appeal should take at least a year and a half, and given the complexity of the case, rather two years, has there shown to the Court of justice of the EU.

Google said declined to comment further. And lodging the appeal does not suspend the fine, meaning Google is still obliged to pay, although it can put the money in a blocked account until a decision is made.

The EU Court of Justice (ECJ) ordered a lower tribunal last week to re-examine US chipmaker Intel's appeal against a 1.06 billion euro fine, a rare setback for the Commission.

Brussels accused Google of giving its own service too much priority in search results at the expense of other price comparison services, such as TripAdvisor and Expedia.

European regulators are also expected to levy further fines in separate cases over Google's Android smartphone software and its AdSense advertising business as early as next month.

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